The Unicept - An Introduction
In 1969, an intellectual exercise was developed by Chuck Dederich, Dan Garrett, Reid Kimball that Chuck named the Unicept Drill. This was a form of thinking gymnastics that requires seeing…
Unicept Drill Example - How to share the fleet
In 1969, an intellectual exercise was developed by Chuck Dederich, Dan Garrett, Reid Kimball that Chuck named the Unicept Drill. This was a form of thinking gymnastics that requires seeing several related ideas simultaneously from many points of view to arrive at a new idea that incorporates all considered. Synanon residents joined into this exercise, organizing into Unicept Posses who met once a week to conduct one-hour Unicept Drills.
As a group or on your own. Although this was not the only way to do this exercise, in my recollection, posses began using the Unicept drills for problem-solving and conflict resolution.
Example of a Unicept Drill: Sharing Vehicles (see above). Take three issues that represent elements of a Synanon community problem: determining how to share a fleet of vehicles that was significantly less in number than the number of drivers.
Three Concepts: Three reasons for the problem might be cited. Gas Shortage - Too few vehicles - Unscheduled trips
Apprehend: Each idea is put into a circle and then apprehended/analyzed/diagnosed. The facilitator tracks the discussion by linking ideas expressed of how each of the three problems effects the overall condition.
Connect the Concepts: Next, the facilitator draws a triangle connecting the three circles, naming each connecting line as the relationship between the two of the three concepts.
Comprehend All Three: Next, the facilitator draws one circle and then inserts a triangle with vectors that extend beyond the circumference. Each vector is labeled with one of the concepts residing in the center of the previous three circles. Each vector communicates that the idea reaches out to connect with additional ideas beyond the group under consideration.
Impinging Factor: From a 10,000 foot view, an idea, incident, a disruption (Rainy Days) is identified that impacts the circle, changing the existing conditions.
Think at the speed of light: The Posse engages in a rather chaotic, yet focused brainstorming session, attempting to simultaneously occupy several points of view of all ideas under consideration.
The Unicept: Through this brainstorming exercise, with minds thinking about ideas at the speed of light, a new idea can be revealed that incorporates all of the ideas put forth. Uniceptualizing = Using our minds to enter an Einsteinian Motion Normal Universe to reveal many ideas simultaneously emerge as one.
Andre James
December 2022
Uniceptualizing Introduction
Reprint of Synanon Article, circa 1970
Author unknown
The history of Synanon, from one ways of viewing, is the story of the discussion and diagramming of Synanon Concepts. For some concepts, a mathematical representation has been developed in the form of diagrams. These concepts are often referred to by labels. For example, the “T-Bar”, or the “Flipping Box”. Other concepts have been studied with only occasional reference to diagrams. For example: “It is better to be rich and healthy than sick and poor.” For many reasons, it seems that concepts with diagrams have been more efficiently thrown into the “teaching-learning wheel” than concepts without diagrams.
On the morning of September 25, 1969, Chuck and Dan met, to resume their long-standing dialogue in which Synanon concepts originated. This morning’s dialogue kicked off on some notions Dan had after reading Marshall McLuhan. Reid Kimball joined the conversation. Within two hours the most important Synanon concept, next to the concept of Synanon itself, had emerged in a low, dramatic voice. “Percept, concept, Unicept,” Chuck spoke. “Uniceptualizing Uniceptive, Unicept. There’s a word which is going to be in the dictionary.
“That’s the word!” Dan shouted.
Five minutes later, a drawing, a diagram of the Uniceptualizing Process was chalked on the board, and the pieces fell together. A new “Thickened Light” tape was born.
Uniceptualizing is a very way of being. It is a total thinking learning feeling process the Uniceptualizer realizer is the Zen cook who will sharpen his knife once a year, slices chicken with four perfect strokes and prepares exquisite rice kebab in 14 minutes.
The Uniceptualizer views the world from the third position, from reality, from the land of unity. His worth is infinite to himself… to others, to Synanon for his way of viewing is uniquely his own and his actions cause new physical and human realities. He is the decision maker who sees just what needs to be done and how to do it. Chuck for instance is constantly able to see where Synanon has been, where it is, where it is going and what needs to be done at this time to get it where he wants it to go. The Uniceptualizer is firmly rooted in a moral position. he is aware of the permanent purpose to which his life is devoted, and he has the precision tools necessary to conduct his life's business. The Uniceptualizer is very different from the conceptualizer. The conceptualizer solves problems and makes decisions in the only way he knows how: he creates concepts, he makes connects between the concepts he has created, and from this pile of connects, he selects one which he uses as an indicator of the way to solve a problem.
In deciding which of two men should be given a truck driver job for instance, the conceptualizer will examine a whole variety of concepts. He will weigh, with elaborate computations upon, and compare vigorously the relative experience of abilities and personalities of two men who applied for the job. Finally, he will connect his concepts, and choose a man for the job because man A has 15 days more driving experience than man B. The conceptualizer decision making process is clearly inefficient and unreliable in the human sphere.
Imagine if the conceptualizer had one job to allocate, and 20 applicants, each with 12 years truck driving experience. He would have to process hundreds and hundreds of concepts and thousands of connects. His brain would overload. Problem solving requires other tools.
The Uniceptualizer solves problems quickly and efficiently. He puts his mind in gear. As two suspended magnets will come to hover face to face, improper relation to each other, so the Uniceptualizer’s thinking process allows concepts to arrange themselves improper balance, in accord with the laws of the force field created by a total problem. The Uniceptualizer creates this proper balance by expanding many concepts into a manageable one, and then putting the result team circle into motion. The Uniceptualizer ignites his own thoughts centrifuge. In selecting a man for a job, the Uniceptualizer simply chooses the man who emerges from the circling spinning viewing process.
A perfect example the Uniceptualizing process arose in a recent Regents Conference. “Who shall be sent to run the New York Synanon House?” Many prominent names were suggested, but none seemed to harmonize perfectly with the needs and goals of the total Synanon system. Amidst the general conceptual confusion, Chuck bellowed, “Why not send the Ken Elias’s?” The proper people for the job had emerged. The purposes of the Academy, of the outpost, and of the progress of Synanon were well served by this choice. This example illustrated why a conceptualizer, even at his best, is not a Uniceptualizer. The Uniceptualizer is always in touch with a total process, in this case, Synanon. He solves problems just by watching and waiting until the one answer which will restore the balance of a system emerges. When it emerges, he grabs it. The conceptualizer, in the meantime, is still weighing the merits and demerits of all those who are available for the job. In this context, it is clear what enormous power and vision goes immediately to those who learn to Uniceptualize. The Uniceptualizer can solve human problems, for he understands the forces, laws, and gentle ways of nature.
Uniceptualize can be learned by everyone. First, listen to the tape ‘The Unicept’. The tape contains the basic information. It tells what Uniceptualizing is. Knowing about Uniceptualizing is not the same as learning how to begin to Uniceptualize.
The process which has been discovered for producing Uniceptualizing is the Unicept Drill. Take the drill seriously. The drill may be the most important idea in the history of human thought.
The Unicept Drill consists of studying Unicept. There is nothing mysterious or elegant about this learning process called the Unicept Drill. It is plain hard work. A Unicept is just a drawing, any drawing or diagram of any process or concept, circled, and then put into motion.
Study the Unicept Drawing. This injunction is to be taken literally. There are no shortcuts or by-passes. Currently, the only way to study Uniceptualizing is to study a Unicept drawing. How long are the lines in your drawing? Are they in or out of balance with each other? Close or far away from each other? Are there irrelevant lines or triangles? Must dots be added to make it feel right? Is your drawing moving fast enough? These and many other deceptively simple questions must me asked of each drawing, as part of the Unicept Drill.
Dan Garrett said that several years ago, he took the Credence Scale Drill seriously. He spent long hour at the blackboard and at his desk sketching perfect diagrams and studying them. Over and over, he plotted people’s statements on the Credence Scale in his brain. Finally, the discontinuous change occurred. This drill for relative thinking, The Credence Scale, became autonomic, and settled silently in his forebrain as a tool for his mind. If you persevere, the Unicept Drill will work the same way for you.
Start your study with the Unicept drawings which accompany the original tape session. Study them in detail. Change them as you go. Whenever you make a new drawing, circle it and put it into motion. It will then be a Unicept. Putting circled concepts into motion always creates a Unicept, which is the ‘A’ factor. It is the quality of a universe which demands a Inceptual approach. Wherever motion is there must be Uniceptualization.
The Unicept Drill is Synanon’s discovery for teaching about the motion normal Einsteinian Universe.
An example of the transformation of a static drawing into a motion normal Unicept is found in the color wheel. If a color wheel is spun around quickly, the colors fuse into white light. The white light which is perceived cannot be accounted for by an explanation which combines the parts of the wheel, the red, blue, green colors. Something else is needed. Rotary motion has been added; a Unicept is created.
There is another way of making a circled drawing a Unicept besides rotation the circle itself. Start off viewing the circled concept from a point outside the circle, then move yourself to another point of view, then another, then another, until you are changing points of view at the speed of light. It is a characteristic of viewing that that faster your move, the faster the stationary object you are viewing appears to move. As with telephone poles viewed from a moving train. This method of producing Uniceptual viewing by changing your points of view so rapidly that your moment-to-moment positions become a line which meets itself in a Uniceptual viewing circle can be used as a reminder whenever you are “stuck in some position” during your attempts to learn how to Unicpetualize. Move toa point at some distance from the circled drawing, and keep rapidly changing your points of view, until motion normal viewing is established.
Several motion processes are listed on the following pages. Study the drawings and concepts which represent them. Construct Uniceptual drawings for them. Make a drawing, for instance, which represents the process which is named mass or energy. Draw some lines. Label them density, volume, molecules, etc. To Uniceptualize, connect the lines. Draw a circle around these lines and figures. Put the concepts in motion, either by rotating the circle, or by moving yourself around this circle, constantly changing your point of view. See what happens. Once you understand that a Unicept is, you will discover millions of available processes and concepts for drilling all around you. The ones listed are really starting points. Do the drills repeatedly. Just take a concept. Make a diagram of it. And circle it. Put it in motion. Create viewing by changing your point of view rapidly and continuously. Study the drawing and all of its facets. The individual frames of the drill will soon become a motion picture. It's so simple. Draw the diagrams wherever you are, in your head, in the dirt, on paper. Plot the day's events as you walk along, make them into a Unicept. Study them. This is the Uniceptual process, the recreation of a universe in motion. Trust the process, persevere, and you will become a Uniceptualizer. Now is the time for us to start learning. Carry on with the Unicept drawing drill.
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